Despite decades if not centuries of bitter experience, business leaders apparently haven't absorbed the lesson that it's best to let your products speak for themselves and keep your big mouth shut.

The latest executive to learn this the hard way is Dan Cathy, president of the family-owned fast-food chain Chick-fil-A. In an interview with a Baptist publication and an appearance on a devotional radio program, Cathy unburdened himself of the view that gay marriage violated God's plan.

"We are very much supportive of the family — the biblical definition of the family unit," he told the Biblical Recorder. On the radio, he observed: "I think we are inviting God's judgment on our nation when we shake our fist at him and say we know better than you as to what constitutes a marriage."